My husband got a light sweatshirt for his birthday one year. He wasn't going to wear it so I started wearing it to the shower when we were camping. I really liked it. I didn't have to take clean clothes to public showers, and I could dress quickly and get back to the camper when I was done. The only thing was the dress was a smidge too short and ya know I was commando.

Here is a picture of the fabric close up and the front pocket, which I meticulously matched perfectly only to realize now no one knows it's there. The fabric was called "Camping Badges." It's not really very campingly themed, IMO.

Here's another Appleton with Vera sleeves.  I actually started this before my niece's wedding to see if I could make a dress in a more subdued fabric. This fabric I got at Joann's; it's some sort of brushed cotton/poly mix. 

So it started off as a floor-length dress. One big problem with this dress is that I decided to line it. All by my lonesome, with no instruction. Since it was a wrap dress, that meant improvising, which usually doesn't turn out too well when I'm doing it. Spoiler: it didn't.

Once I saw that it wasn't going to work as a formal gown, I put it aside until after the wedding. 

Today I had the energy to cut it down and hem it. 

It was actually quite hideous as a floor-length dress. So much polka dot, and it drooped with the weight. But the reason I decided to trim and finish it was because I really loved the sleeves and I think the wrap is a good look for me. I thought maybe the dress could be saved.

​I couldn't decide whether to keep the lining or remove it. The polka dot fabric is a bit light and because I'd sewn it and the lining together at the seams, it would have been a hassle to rip out the lining. 

More improvising ensued to finish the dress below the waist. 

In the end, this thing is okay except for one thing. It's super uncomfortable at the armhole. The discomfort seems to be coming from the lining.  So I probably won't be wearing this. But I do want to try it again in a fabric I like.

I lengthened a Cashmerette Appleton dress and mixed it with the sleeves from Forget-me-not's Vera top.

I needed a long dress for a formal wedding reception—the same wedding that I made my sister's dress for. My other sister found a nice dress in a vintage store, so I looked there and found a dress option. It had hideous fringe on it that I could have taken off but I don't like that kind of work so I took it to a seamstress. She removed it for $120 and 2 weeks.  I also found a blingy jacket at the vintage shop. 

My daughter ended up wearing this dress at the wedding and reception.

But then I was in Salvation Army and looked at dresses there. I found 2 possibilities. One was a knit gown with georgette overlay and flutter sleeves. I call it the funeral gown. The other was a knit that hit me at the ankles. I call it the one-dollar dress because that's all it cost, heh heh. Now the one-dollar dress is sleeveless. I either have to make sleeves or wear the jacket with it. I made test sleeves out of a knit mesh and propped them in to see how they would look.

​As an aside, I found this mesh in the chaos of Joann's going-out-of-business fake sale. (Everything marked up and only 10% off.) Still, I was happy to find what I was looking for at a brick-and-mortar the day I wanted it.

All along, I had been toying with the idea of making my own dress. I had bought McCall's 7047 during vacation and some black knit on another trip to Joann's during the fake sale. I also had enough black knit sequin fabric in my stash to make the sash. But I had so little time, I could not make a mockup to test the fit or the look of the dress's style on my body. I had looked at pictures on Pattern Review and the dresses there looked good, but I just lost confidence that this pattern would work out smoothly or look acceptable on me.

​My niece had showed me photos of dresses other people were wearing and another aunt of hers was wearing a wrap. Then I had a brainstorm that if a wrap was acceptable, I had an Appleton pattern all fitted for me that might work. I'd just have to lengthen it and find a suitable fabric. I considered using the black knit I already had, but I was worried I would be just a little short.

All continual digs at Joann's aside, I headed there again looking for some other fabric for this formal Appleton. I really didn't see anything I liked but I got a polka-dot knit that could have worked. 

But then serendipity. I was searching for other local fabric stores (none) and found an old post from 2015 on Pattern Review. The writer mentioned a shop I used to go to (closed now) and referred to someone there who had sold fabric there. I was pretty sure she was a friend of mine, so I texted her to say I saw her referred to in that post. But get this: she still has loads of bolts left over from when she left that venture, and she invited me to come and shop her closet.

She had a lot of beautiful fabric, but none really suited me for this wedding. The closest thing was this black-and-white animal print with sparkles. What the hell, I gave it shot. It fits nicely. 

UPDATE: I chose to wear the shiny zebra dress. In retrospect, I can't believe I did; it's extremely outlandish! Even the funeral dress would have been more elegant. But I'm vain and I had to wear what I made. And a bonus is my daughter had a nice dress to wear. 

O.M.G. I did it. I completed an actual Upton in real fabric (a lawn). 

I lost count but looking at this pile, it was at least 10 muslins. ​

This post documents the first set of muslin making, which mostly was trying to figure out which base size to start with and a few major adjustments (lower bust point, lengthen torso, and do forward shoulder adjustment). I went with a size 4 and a C/D bust. I also lost track of all the changes I made, but here are those I remember:

1. Graded to a 6 at the waist and hips
2. Lowered BP 1 inch
3. Lengthened torso 1 inch 
4. Made a forward shoulder adjustment
5. Scooped out curve on princess seam above and below bust point
6. Took darts out of neckline to reduce gaping, 1/4" on each side, tapering to nothing toward bust
7. Lowered armpit 1/2" and lengthened sleeve curve correspondingly
8. Shortened skirt. A lot. A total of maybe 4–5 inches
9. Changed closure from a back zipper to a button front (Cut back on fold instead of front. Cut front along center front and added seam allowance. Added a placket.)
10. Finally, I made bias binding and used it on the neckline

Oh yeah. I did add the pockets but could have kicked myself after. I don't really need pockets and I think they might disturb the fall of the skirt. Also, I didn't put notches on the pattern where they were supposed to go and I put them a little too low. 

Still this is super comfortable and I'm pretty pleased. I'm not sure I like the box pleats. The next one I make (I bought the fabric at the same time I bought the fabric for this version) might get regular pleats like on the McCalls shirtdress I made that this Upton is supposed to be an improvement on. It is, with the possible exception of the pleats.

Oh, I almost forgot. I discovered a couple new things about my machine. First, OMG it's so easy to sew buttons on with it.

However, I had to lower the feed dogs to do it—that's how it's done on my Pfaff—but I forgot that the stupid things get stuck when put down. So, I found a single YouTube where a guy explained how to fix it on a machine similar to mine (the predecessor, I suppose), and I managed to fix mine using his information even though my machine is not constructed the same. They updated the guts but still made a feed dog mechanism that sucks.

Finally, my buttonhole function is going haywire. I sewed about 5 buttonholes, and it started screwing up, jamming and bunching thread. Then I noticed only 1 of the buttonholes I'd sewn was correct. I had to take them all out and research alternatives. I found a good YouTube that showed a system that worked for me. 

1. Mark the buttonhole placement (a vertical line through the middle and a top and bottom line that can be seen when the presser foot is down)
2. The basic idea is to sew a wide zigzag at the top of the hole (5 stitches), a narrow zigzag along the right and left sides, and another wide zigzag at the bottom (another 5 stitches). 
3. The settings I used for WIDE were: length, 0.8, width 6.0 and NARROW: length 0.8, width 2.5. Worked like a charm and without the anxiety of that stupid automatic buttonhole.

The Upton fitting directions say to sew up the WHOLE dress for each muslin. Thank goodness I was reading Sarah Veblen's fitting book while I was working on this dress. She says no to sleeves and skirt, just fit the bodice first. I also found her HBL or horizontal balance lines very helpful with the second set of muslins. But I learned how to adjust the princess line by watching this really helpful video where she explains how a princess seam is just a version of a darted bodice and how to get a good line for your body. 

Descended into lunacy yet again. My community orchestra is doing movie tunes and the management announced that we could dress up. So of course I thought I would make an outfit.  Ironically, I just want to make it. I don't even want to wear a costume to play an orchestra concert!

I planned a very simple outfit. It took me hours and hours and hours to make it. From getting the (cheap) fabric I wanted in the right color to making pattern adustments and mockups to cutting and sewing polyester charmeuse and polyester chiffon (OMG), it took longer than I anticipated. 

Also, in addition to forgetting to put on my necklace for this photo shoot, I put the lace overlay on backwards. HAHAHAHA.

I saw a photo of the front view, and I thought, "crap! how do the necklines not match?" Well! At least it's better than discovering I sewed it wrong!

The picture below has the dress on the right way. 

So I am not buying shoes to go with this but I have some I thought would work pretty well. Eh, not so much. But still, they'll have to do.

Then I saw the Upton by Cashmerette. I was under the impression that Cashmerette patterns might be drafted for shapes closer to mine, which, I learned after lots of muslin-making,  turned out to be not true. But with the expansion pack, you get a lot of options for darts or princess seams, sleeves, and skirt. Plus, different cup sizes!

So I decided to sew up the Upton.
​
Sidenote

• The first major problem was printing the PDF. I have been going to Office Max/Depot a block away and they were doing a nice job for an affordable price. No more. They won't use their blueprint printer on patterns, only their poster printer. $30 a page. C'mon. Just say you won't do it anymore. Don't put customers through that bullshit.
  
  So I tried FedEx. They have a DIY blueprint printer, and I used it. It was much cheaper than Office Max/Depot, but still expensive. I don't want to admit how much I paid, but it was a LOT for 6 or 7 sheets.
  
  From now on it's PDF Plotting.com. I just ordered the Kitty pattern printed--$2.45 a page. Now we're talking.
  
  UPDATE 2023: PDF Plotting is also out. I guess they knew they were on to a good thing because their prices went up and enough that I won't use them now. I'll just print out f--ing 8.5 x 11 on my laser printer and tape shit together. ugh. 

​Back to the dress

I knew I'd have to close up the back and cut the front open to add plackets and buttons, but I didn't think that would be too big a deal. 

I don't know what my problem is, but fuck, 5 muslins and I'm still not ready to cut into good fabric. 

One thing is I have not been super careful keeping track of things. The first muslin was pretty close, so I guess I was sure if I made a couple tweaks, I'd be there. But no, 5 muslins later and I'm not 100% sure which mockups are which versions, especially what size sleeves I stuck in each one. Ooopsie. 

I lowered the bust point 1 inch and also lengthened the torso 3/4 inch.

Fit: Princess curve better fits breast shape, but it is still too far out on the outside. Shoulders are tight. Neckline is loose. Back waistline is too high.

In addition to lowering the bust point, I increased the length on the torso to 1 full inch. The major change here was that I took out width from center front seam. I think it was 2 full inches. It might have been 1. To add back in the missing width at the waist and hips, I added it to the side seams so the CF stayed on grain. The point of this change was to remove all the neckline gaping and bring the bust curve closer to the bust. It worked! Unfortunately, it also screwed up everything else. The armholes are way too tight and the back is too tight (how?)

Fit: The princess seam goes mostly where it should along breast. It is too tight across the back, shoulders, armscye, and now chest again. The back waistline still too high.

On Review of the Fit

I think I will go back to the C/D cup, size 4. The changes I will start with are:

1. Grade to a 6 at the waist and hips
2. Lower BP 1 inch
3. Lengthen torso 1 inch and maybe add another 1/2 to 1 inch length on back torso at the shoulder blade level. No, I had better wait until I make the forward shoulder adustment
4. Make a forward shoulder adjustment

I saw a video where someone explained how princess seams are darts. So I decided to sew the darted version to see exactly how the darts were designed and I figured they'd be easier to adjust.

So I sewed a C/D bust, size 4 grading to 6 at the waist.  I sewed size 6 sleeves into the size 4 armholes. I did lengthen the bodice 1" but I didn't lower the bust point yet. I did move the shoulder seam at the shoulder 1/2" forward.

Fit: I don't know. Feels more comfortable, but doesn't look very fitted! The bust dart is too low and needs to move an inch toward the center front. (I only sewed one bust dart up.) The back still hikes up. The armpits are too tight. Also, the front waist darts need to be moved an inch toward the center front. I think the front shoulder adjustment helped.

Also, don't know what the fuck is happening in the back. The back waistband is smaller than the back so I "eased" it in on this mockup.

Next:

1. Move the front bodice darts (bust darts down 1/2" and toward CF 3/4"; waist darts 3/4" to 1" toward center)
2. Adjust sleeve head for the front shoulder adjustment (forgot and did on fly while sewing)
3. Lower armhole and adjust sleeve as necessary (can't remember)
4. Add 1" length to CB and taper to side seams. Or maybe wait until I have the bodice fitting okay (maybe tightness somewhere is pulling everything toward front and lifting up back?)

I spent all of one day, surely 8+ hours, and half of the next working on the f--ing bodice. I made three muslins. I tried to adjust the fit my way, but the resulting muslins were disasters. Then I tried it the way the pattern instructions suggested, and thought I had nailed it.

After making my own 1/4" bias binding, sewing it around the neckline and armseyes—one side of which was by hand for Pete's sake—gathering the skirt, and sewing on all those frigging hooks eyes, I discovered the fit of the bodice totally sucked. 

Jeez, just look a this!!! It's so maddening!!!

Before realizing the whole effort was a disaster, I had had a couple epiphanies on this project I was so proud of.

1. I sewed them hem of the skirt before I sewed the side seams. God, it was so much easier to control the fabric and get an even seam! I left enough unsewn at the sides to be able to sew up the side seams and then finish the hem.
2. I didn't want the poofy sleeves of the Folkwear patterns blouse. I wanted fitted sleeves. So I was looking through patterns and looking around my sewing room,  and then it dawned on me what I wanted was pretty close to the chemise I sewed for my Jane Austen outfit that turned into my nightgown and that then finally ended up in a bin for refashioning. I shortened it and added a ruffle along the bottom, and ta da! I had a blouse like I wanted and a petticoat.
3. I sewed the gathered skirt to 1" twill tape and then attached the twill tape to the bodice. This was brilliant, worked like a charm, and will be duplicated whenever appropriate. I got the idea when I was thinking how uncomfortable the waist felt to me when I was to wear a gathered skirt. I realized you sew right sides together and then the fabric falls back on itself, doubling the bulk at the waist. Then the twill tape occurred to me. It was a billion times easier adjusting the gathering along the length of the tape than doing it without the stability of the tape or when pinning it on the bodice. I had a nice long, straight, stable place to work instead of cramped on the inside of a round bodice. 

​​Yeah, so I don't know what I'm going to do. I could take a couple darts out of the neckline at the gussets and maybe make it wearable for my next shift at Oktoberfest. If I get time, I might try to make another bodice. At least it would be easy to take the skirt off and resew it because of my twill tape trick.

One thing I will do differently is either sew a zipper in, because why the heck not? Hooks and eyes? Sheesh. Or sew a pattern with front lacing. That way, I could have some flexibility with fitting, pulling the laces tighter if I needed it, or loosening them if I needed that. Like this:

Update 8/25/2024: I fixed it in time for this year's Oktoberfest! I undid the middle closure, removed 1.5 inches from each side by folding over, and added grommets. It's not perfect, but it's a costume, people.

That was at least a couple years ago. It probably took me another year to sew a dress out of the pattern, and when I did it was because I had found a jersey sheet at Goodwill that I could use without risking any good fabric.

Well, the dress turned out really nicely. So nicely, in fact, that I wear that Goodwill sheet Gap dress a lot. It's pretty short and I never hemmed it, so I don't wear it in public...much. But when it's hot, it's awfully nice to wear that lightweight little number.

Now, I have been meaning to make another for some time. But lots of other things got in the way or took precedence. Then inspiration hit. I was at Joann's getting something for one of the projects I was working on recently...I can't remember what exactly...when I thought: "why not check out the bargain bin again?" 

And I found a jewel...a lovely cotton interlock with Marvel superheroes on it...for $3 a yard. C'mon. I could not pass it up.

It didn't take me long to make it up. It's ridiculously easy to put this dress together—except for the f-ing bands. OMG I took out the neckline band twice before I got it where I wanted it. I first sewed it in wrong. Okay, I had only basted that in but still. I rebasted and used my coverstitch. It was infuriatingly bad. Uneven, all over the place, hideous. I came upstairs cursing how much I hated that Janome Coverstitch 900, how I would never use it again, and bemoaning the fact that I chose it over a Babylock (because it was so much less expensive although it was still not cheap). I even started to hunt around for a Babylock Euphoria. 

I cooled off, went back to the sewing room, and I ripped the neckline out, not fun, and rebasted and then used a twin needle. That worked beautifully.

I had already done the armbands 0n the coverstitch. They were okay, not great, but not noticeable enough for me to rip them out and do them over.  

I added about 4 inches to the pattern that I made and used for the Goodwill version, but I ended up cutting off 2 inches before hemming. Isn't it cute?

Closeup of the neckline and fabric design:

Soon after I was back at Joann's getting buttons for the blue linen Harvey when I thought..."what if there is another awesome bargain in that bin?" And do you know what? There was: a similar Marvel-themed interlock, also for $3 a yard. I made up another Gap-copy dress as soon as I had washed the fabric.

This time I went straight to the twin-needle technique but I started with the hem, thank goodness. Because it looked like crap. I tried many settings on my machine and it just would not stop tunneling.

Frustrated, I went back to the coverstitch and tested some stitches on the new fabric. Still terrible. Then, fortunately, it dawned on me that I might not have the settings in the best place. Maybe I could do some research.

I first went to YouTube and found a very helpful and basic tutorial about my machine on the Last Stitch channel. She noted the importance of the differential feed setting. So next I checked in the manual. OMG. Somehow all my settings were in all sorts of strange places. I returned all the tensions, the stitch lengths, and the stitch widths back to recommended settings and played with the differential feed a little and found a setting that created a beautiful hem. 

Finally, I basted the arm and neckbands on and coverstitched those. The neckline. Arrrgh! I decided to baste it down on the front and follow the basting on the coverstitch. It turned out much better than when my settings were all awry, but still, the stitch placement was not perfect, and wouldn't you know, the worst spot was on the front. There is a little lip the floats a little bit above the main fabric and irritates me (my sensibilities, not my skin). Still, in the end, I said "fuck it. It's good enough." Now if I can only lose 20 pounds, it might be downright adorable.

Closeup of the neckline and fabric design:

I'm starting to feel the heat. When I was younger, it couldn't get hot or humid enough for me. But now, when it's around 90, I am uncomfortable. I am playing in a summer orchestra, and we rehearse in an unconditioned church, so I wanted to find something breathable to wear.

I have my white linen Harvey that I had made a couple years ago for the beach at Hilton Head. I wore it to rehearsal, but because it's fairly see-through, I wore it with some yoga pants. My top half felt great, but my bottom half was pretty sweaty.

It then occurred to me that I had plenty of a heavier-weight linen that I'd used to make a sheath dress (which turned out to be too big at the shoulders and hideous because of that). ​

Ooooh, that is actually too flattering a picture. This one is more accurate:

The blue linen is heavier than the white linen. It still feels breathable, but I am looking forward to test driving it in the hot church to see if it's comfortable.

Something else I've wanted to sew for a LONG time is a wrap dress. I have had two patterns in my stash for probably a decade. I got the Style Arc Kate dress pattern first. I made a couple other dresses from a Style Arc pattern (here and, just so hideous: here) and decided the company's pattern model was very different from my body--theirs is long and lean and I'm curvy and short-waisted. Still, I have taken this pattern out a couple times over the years to reflect and consider making it. The last time I looked at it I had to laugh. I bought a size 8--and with Style Arc they only give you one size--and really doubted I could have fit into that. Somewhere along the line I bought the Vogue pattern. The envelope drawings didn't fill me with confidence that Vogue's pattern model would be any closer to me but I guess I figured the pattern came with lots of sizes and that might help. Having had so many fitting issues, I never got time or nerve to cut these out. Plus, that cleavage on the Vogue pattern drawing scared me. I don't like a neckline that's too low and that seems one of the big pitfalls with the wrap design.

Then came Cashmerette. I trusted that the company could draft for curves and their patterns always come with different cup sizes. But at the time, they didn't carry my size. I still ordered a print pattern when I got some fitting advice from a representative at the company. She told me to do an SBA, which is so funny since almost every top I make needs an FBA. 

At some point, I came across another wrap pattern -- the Ellie Mac tres belle wrap -- and even considered getting it. There are plenty of other wrap patterns out there. But I thought, no, sew up one of the three you already own.

I never got the time to sew the Appleton print pattern up before the company came out with 0-12 sizing. Also, they have a great sizing tool on their site where you can enter your measurements and it tells you what size to cut and sew. I got the PDF which was nice in that I could display and print only the sizes/lines I needed, and it smoothed between the sizes (in effect) so I didn't need to draw in the grading.

Sizing notes. When I first used the sizing tool, I don't know what I weighed but I was told to use a G/H cup and a size 4 grading to an 8 (I think). When I used the tool just now, I was told to use an E/F cup and grade from a 4 to an 8 using my current measurements [b 36, w 29, h 40.5, cup D]. I plugged in my measurements at my ideal weight [b 34, w 27, h 39, cup D; my high bust is always 32] and was instructed to use a C/D cup and grade from a 2 at the bust to a 4 at the waist to an 8 at the hips. (Size 2? Not a chance. The 4 fits well, but the sleeves are right on the verge of being too small). I don't get where the G/H cup size came in. Was I even fatter? Who knows. Memo to self: take better notes in real time. (The fitting advice I got for the larger-sizing pattern said the E/F cup was right. Maybe I should do that next time...but it will be the real fabric...and what if it's too small? Always tricky.)

Now that I am retired I have some time. So I decided to sew a mockup using some silk jersey I have had in my stash. I know. Silk jersey for a mockup. Sinfully wasteful. But the pattern on the fabric is weird. And frankly, silk jersey has not been my friend. It is absolutely lovely to sew with, and it feels like a cloud when it's on, but I don't like how it hugs and accentuates all my cellulitic bumps. Perhaps twiggy or buff bodies look great in silk jersey, but not me. So I made it and it fits me pretty well. The band was too long as drafted--it basically was the same length as the dress edge it was being sewed to, which would have let the neckline droop. So I sliced off two inches before sewing it on permanently. I think it could have been an additional 2 inches shorter to tighten up the opening.

So as I was cutting out the fabric, my husband said he thought it was beautiful. So in case it might turn out to be wearable, I lined the front and back pieces with some swimsuit lining I had in my stash. I liked it better for this silk jersey than the knit lining I used on my purple holy grail dress. It matched the weave of the silk a little better. I like how that decision turned out. It came together well and the drape looks good on the final dress. It did give me a little protection from the cellulite-broadcasting power of the silk jersey, as intended. 

The sleeves were too short for me. I'm sure the dress would look a little better overall with the true cap, but I just need more coverage. So I put a 2"-inch band on. 

I probably hemmed it too short. It seems too short for this dress pattern; the proportions might look better if the bit below the waist were longer, as in the picture of the model at the top of this post. Maybe it's hard to tell with these pictures but you can see how the bottom half is shorter than in the Cashmerette model.

I'm still a little timid about wearing it into public for fear it's a ghastly pattern. You can't always trust the husband in these cases. I'll run it past my sisters. 

UPDATE: I ran it past my daughter and she said no. Well, she commented on the cling power of the fabric, very diplomatically, as is her way. I am done with silk jersey, people. I hope some lucky person at Goodwill takes a shine to it because that's where it went.

Next, I will try to make another velvet Christmas dress. This time, I will use green stretch velvet (already ordered, from Cali Fabrics), and this pattern. I got the idea to sew a velvet Appleton when I saw the one Sew Sarah Smith did (and in fact, that was what motivated me in the end to purchase the first, print, Appleton pattern I bought.). Subsequently I have come across others: Sew Fearless and Bimble and Pimble.

I ordered this on my phone. It's "hunter green." God, I hope it's not hideous. Maybe I should have tried red again.

Update: Cali did not have the green, so I said okay send me the red. It's still folded in my stash.